赏析版2012年1月经济学人文章（英汉双语对照）汇集

大家论坛 赏析版2012年1月经济学人文章（英汉双语对照）汇集 Contents 1 [2012.01.31]Libya bitten, Syria shy一朝被利比亚咬,十年怕叙利亚 2 [2012.01.28]Ant tribes and mortgage slaves 蚁族与房奴 4 [2012.01.28]Who goes to the gallows? 谁该上绞架？— 公众关注吴英案 5 [2012.01.28]Black, white and blood red 黑色白色与血色 8 [2012.01.25]Phew, the Oscars are still irrelevant 奥斯卡奖还是不靠谱 9 [2012.01.23]Gender & tennis: Coming up short 女网的不足 12 [2012.01.23]China's labour force 中国的劳动力大军 13 [2012.01.21]Not quite too late 还不算太晚 16 [2012.01.21]Guatemala's new president: Quick march 新总统必须加快改革 18 [2012.01.21]Party of two， 二人成双 21 [2012.01.19]The Nordic cure for a hangover治疗宿醉的北欧疗法 22 [2012.01.16]IN SEARCH OF SERENDIPITY 寻找偶遇 28 [2012.01.07]The dangers of demonology 妖魔化的风险 31 [2012.01.07]A murder that changed Britain 改变英国的凶杀案 34 [2012.01.07]Dutchmen grounded 搁浅的荷兰人 39 [2012.01.07]New film: "The Iron Lady” 新电影：《铁娘子》 40 [2012.01.07]Chinese condoms: Reds in the bed 床上的红色安全套 42 [2012.01.05]A World of Mist 照片散文－雾的世界 47 [2012.01.02]Take five 目标：攻克五种癌症 [2012.01.31]Libya bitten, Syria shy一朝被利比亚咬,十年怕叙利亚 Syria and the UN 叙利亚和联合国 Libya bitten, Syria shy 一朝被利比亚咬，十年怕叙利亚 Jan 31st 2012, 20:59 by R.L.G. | NEW YORK IN 2005 all the world's countries signed up, in theory, to a new norm called the "responsibility to protect". In short, the idea is that a government is sovereign because it protects its people. When it cannot do so—or worse, is the perpetrator of mass violence against its own—the responsibility to protect them may devolve to the international community. For a while, this norm was mostly airy, referred to when other countries or United Nations diplomats got involved to stop violence in its earliest phases. But some construe the "responsibility to protect" as a mandate for "liberal interventionism": the right of outside countries to step in militarily when abuses get serious enough. 2005全世界所有的国家从理论上签订了一种新的国际规则，名曰“保护责任”。一言以敝之，这个概念就是指政府的主权在于其对人民的保护。一旦政府不再保护人民，或者更糟——它开始对其人民进行大规模暴行时，保护其人民的责任就自动移交给国际社会了。在一段时间里，这种规则基本上是纸上谈兵，当其它国家或联合国外交家在暴行开始之初进行干涉阻止时加以引用。但是有人把“保护责任”解读为“自由干涉”的一种委任：即当暴行过于严重时，外部国家有用军事力量干涉的权利。 Now outsiders are clamouring to do something serious about Syria. No one is pushing a military intervention—not even the Western countries sounding the harshest notes about Bashar Assad, Syria's dictator. But two of the veto-wielding members of the Security Council, China and particularly Russia, feel that the "responsibility to protect" has already gone far enough, thank you very much. Last year, they signed on to a resolution that authorised "all necessary means" to protect Libyan civilians from Muammar Qaddafi. That intervention became a NATO-led air war against Libya's regime, and ended with Qaddafi's bloody death at the hands of the rebels. The Russians felt duped. 现在外部国家们正在争论要在叙利亚问题上做点实事。现在还没人主张军事干涉，即使那些对叙利亚的独裁者巴沙尔·阿萨德最为斥责的西方国家也还没有提出要付诸武力。但即使这样两个安理会持有一票否决权的常任理事国——中国，以及尤其是俄罗斯已经觉得“保护责任”这个概念有点过头，不能再进一步扩展了。去年，它们签订了一项决议，准许动用“所有必需手段”来保护利比亚平民不受穆阿迈尔·卡扎菲迫害。最终这种干涉演变成了北约领导的对利比亚当局的空袭，之后以卡扎菲惨死于叛军之手而告终。俄罗斯人感到上当了。 This is behind the Russian reticence, this week, to sign on to a draft resolution that would have Mr Assad delegate power to his deputy. This is despite strong support not only from a unified West, but from the Arab League, which has suspended Syria. The assertiveness of the league, once a do-nothing talking shop for tyrants, has been striking. It suspended its observer mission in Syria because of threats to its personnel and inability to do a proper job monitoring. Observers hope that a personal briefing by league representatives about the bloodshed will sway the recalcitrant Security Council members. 正是因为这样，本周各国试图签订一份决议草案，其中涉及让阿萨德将权力转交给他的副手时，俄罗斯对其持保留态度，尽管对此草案的支持不仅来自立场一致的西方，也包括暂停了叙利亚成员资格的阿拉伯联盟。阿盟过去一度被认为是独裁者之间光说不干的一个形式组织，但其最近在多方问题上表现出来的主见令人惊讶。它暂停了其赴叙利亚的观察行动，原因在于观察机构人员受到威胁，且无法正常开展其监察职务。观察机构希望阿盟代表们亲自对于叙利亚目前血腥现状的陈述可以最终说服倔强的安理会成员国。 But the Russians, citing Syria's sovereignty, have shown no sign of budging (which suits the Chinese, who do not like vetoing resolutions alone). The frustrated other members of the 15-seat council are still trying to craft a resolution everyone can agree to. But if they cannot, they have hinted that they will force a vote anyway, to get a Russian veto on the record at least. For those dying in Syria, the manoeuvring must seem absurdly abstract, and Russia's desire for "a peaceful settlement without foreign intervention and with respect to the sovereignty of Syria" somewhere between cynical and downright ridiculous.但是俄罗斯人援引叙利亚的主权，目前还没有流露出任何退让的迹象。这对中国来说正好，因为中国并不想成为唯一否决该决议的国家。15席的安理会中那些倍感挫折的其它成员国现在还在试图起草一份所有人都能接受的决议。但是如果最后无法达成共识，它们也暗示会强迫对决议进行投票，至少要让俄罗斯的否决正式记录在案。对于那些正在被屠杀的叙利亚国民来说，这些外交程序抽象地近乎愚蠢，而俄罗斯希望“寻求无外界干涉和尊重叙利亚主权的和平解决途径”听上去既讽刺又荒谬。 [2012.01.28]Ant tribes and mortgage slaves 蚁族与房奴 China’s new tribes 中国新群落 Ant tribes and mortgage slaves 蚁族与房奴 The subdivisions of urban China 中国城市城市人口的诸多分支 Crush crush “捏捏族” WHO knew China was tribal? The diversification of Chinese society has seen a flowering of a new vocabulary. Perhaps most fascinating has been the division of people into tribes (zu in Mandarin). The travails of the yi zu, or ant tribe, have been well-chronicled—recent graduates from outside the main cities who move to urban areas, live cheaply and work hard, often in low-paid jobs. Perhaps less well-known are the ken lao zu, the bite-the-old tribe, those between 25 and 35 who are underemployed or out of work, still at home and sponging off mum and dad. 你知道中国也有很多群落吗？中国社会的多元化创造了很多丰富多彩的新词。也许最有趣的当属公民所被划分的群落了（普通话称为“族”）。大量的文章在描绘“蚁族”的辛劳。毕业不久的大学生从外地来到大城市，他们辛勤地工作，却挣着微薄的钱、住着廉价的房。也许另一个没这么有名的是“啃老族”。这些介于25到35岁间的年轻人要么半失业，要么完全失业。他们还赖在家里靠着父母过活。 Many of the tribes, inevitably, are made up of people looking for love. There is the jia wan zu, the marry-the-bowl tribe. These are young women searching for that most stable of husbands, the one who holds a government job (still known as the iron rice bowl). The shan hun zu, or lightning-marriage tribe, marry fast and sometimes divorce faster. They should not be confused with the yin hun zu, the hidden-marriage tribe. These are women in their 20s who hide the fact that they are married, knowing they will not be hired or promoted if there is even the whiff of the possible need for maternity leave—socialist gender-equality does not offer much protection in the Wild East of modern China. And if you can only afford a postage stamp of an apartment, you’re probably a member of the wo ju zu, the snail-house tribe. 如人所料，很多“族”由一些寻找爱情的人组成。“嫁碗族”指一群寻找拥有稳定工作的意中人的年轻姑娘，稳定的工作指政府公务员（依旧被称为铁饭碗）。“闪婚族”——嫁得快，有时离得更快。不要把他们和“隐婚族”混了:二十多岁的年轻姑娘隐瞒了已婚的事实，深知一丁点儿要休产假的需要就会让她们丧失雇用和晋升的机会。社会主义国家的性别平等在位于奇异东方的现代中国尚不能给她们提供足够的保护。如果你只能负担得起公寓里的弹丸之地，那你就差不多算是“蜗居族”中的一员了。 You can belong to more than one tribe. Most members of the ant tribe also belong to the ben ben zu, the rush-rush tribe, to which, in fact, most urban Chinese belong. All that rushing around can create a lot of pent-up anger, giving rise to thenie nie zu, the crush-crush tribe, so named because they go into supermarkets and take out their frustration by standing in the aisles crushing packets of instant noodles (yes, really). 你可以同时属于多种“族”。“蚁族”成员多数也是“奔奔族”，事实上，多数城市人口都算得上“奔奔族”。整日奔忙就会产生郁积的愤怒，他们继而变成了“捏捏族”——站在超市过道里，通过捏方便面袋来发泄沮丧（真是这样的）。 Many tribal members are also slaves (nu in Mandarin). There are the fang nu (mortgage slaves) and hun nu (marriage slaves, who are also, by definition, mortgage slaves) and all Chinese parents are of course haizi nu (slaves to the only child). 许多人既是“族”又是“奴”。有“房奴”也有“婚奴”，都是指为按揭所累的人。当然，所有的中国父母都被称作“孩奴”。 Perhaps the group China needs most as it tries to stimulate its domestic consumer economy is the yue guang zu, or moonlight tribe, so named because the Chinese characters for “moonlight” sound the same as the phrase “spend all your monthly salary”. Their parents saved every yuan, but life for these youngsters is just spend, spend, spend. Now, that’s patriotic consumption. 也许中国在极力扩大内需经济的同时，最需要的当属“月光族”了。中文里“月光”听上去和“花光了所有的月薪”一样。父母虽省吃俭用，子女却只懂得花、花、花。不过，现在他们是在为了祖国而消费。 [2012.01.28]Who goes to the gallows? 谁该上绞架？— 公众关注吴英案 Attitudes towards capital punishment 对死刑的态度 Who goes to the gallows? 谁该上绞架? — 中国公众对吴英案的关注 Concern over a high-profile death penalty 中国公众对一宗高曝光度死刑案的热议 IT IS rare for China’s 500m internet users to defend the filthy rich. But a provincial court’s decision on January 18th to uphold a death sentence imposed on one of China’s wealthiest businesswomen has created an unusual outpouring of sympathy. It has also led to criticism of a legal system seen to treat private citizens far more harshly than errant officials. 在拥有五亿用户的中国互联网上，很少能见到网民们为“龌龊的”富人说话。但是，当中国一个省级法院于1月18日作出决定，维持对全国最富有的女人之一吴英的死刑判决时，却引发了异乎寻常的广泛的同情之声。这件事还引发了人们对中国法律体系的批评，这个体系看起来对待普通公民比对待那些不轨的官员要严厉得多。 The case of 31-year-old Wu Ying, who was convicted of “illegal fund-raising”, has also stirred debate about the fairness of the economic system. State-owned enterprises can borrow money from (state-owned) banks, whereas private businesses are often left to fend for themselves in an informal market of moneylending, such as the one in which Ms Wu thrived. 31岁的吴英被指控的罪名是“非法集资”。[注]她的案子还激起了人们关于经济 制度 关于办公室下班关闭电源制度矿山事故隐患举报和奖励制度制度下载人事管理制度doc盘点制度下载 公平性的辩论。国有企业可以从国有银行借钱，但民营企业常常需要在非正规的借贷市场上筹资。吴英就是在这种市场上发的财。 Ms Wu’s youth and humble origins, as well as an absence of real evidence that her activities caused harm to anyone, except possibly some rich investors, have also helped endear her to a general public informed by internet chatter. She began her career working in her aunt’s beauty salon in coastal Zhejiang province, and went on to run other beauty parlours before building up a conglomerate, the Bense Group, with a wide range of interests from property to lending. Amazingly, in 2006, aged just 25, she was named China’s sixth-richest woman by Hurun Report, a wealth researcher. 吴英的年龄和贫苦的家庭背景，以及缺乏损害他人的确切证据（除了一些富有的投资者外），都有助于她得到公众的同情，这些公众人士通常是从互联网的聊天中得知各种信息的。吴英在浙江省她姑母的美容院开始职业生涯，之后开过一些其它的美容院，逐渐建立起一个综合性的大企业 —“本色集团”，经营从地产到借贷各种广泛的业务。令人惊叹的是，当时年仅25岁的吴英，在2006年被胡润报告（一个富豪研究公司）列为中国最富的女人中第六位。 Ms Wu’s extraordinary rise is hard to imagine without her doing some dodgy deals. Possibly the wrong ones, for her fall was even more rapid than her rise. She was arrested, sentenced to death in 2009 for illegally raising $120m in funds from illicit sources (ie, not official banks). Chinese press reports said Ms Wu gave information that led to the arrests of officials and bankers. Some wonder whether the death sentence was aimed at stopping her from revealing more. 吴英能如此迅速的暴发，恐怕是得益于一些巧妙的交易。这些交易很可能是违规的，因为她的衰落比她的暴发更迅速。2009年，她被逮捕并以通过非法渠道（不是通过官方银行）集资1.2亿美元的罪名被判死刑。中国媒体报道说，吴英交代的信息导致了一些政府和银行官员被捕。有些人怀疑死刑判决是为了阻止她进一步暴露更多内幕。 Since 2007 China has required that all death sentences be reviewed by the supreme court, which now represents Ms Wu’s final chance of reprieve. Last year the number of capital crimes was reduced for the first time since 1979. The number of executions in China is a state secret, but the Dui Hua Foundation in California, which promotes improved legal rights in China, estimates that it fell from around 8,000 in 2007 to 4,000 last year. 自2007年以来，中国要求所有死刑判决必须经过最高法院的审核，这是吴英免死的最后机会。去年，中国的死刑案件自1979年以来第一次减少。被执行死刑的人数是国家的机密，但加州的Dui Hua基金会(旨在推进中国人法律权利的组织)估计，这个数字已从2007年的大约8,000人降到了去年的4,000人。 Reforming spirits in China groaned when Wang Shengjun, a man with no legal training, was appointed president of the supreme court in 2008. Mr Wang has been a strong advocate of President Hu Jintao’s idea of the “three supremes” in judicial affairs: the supremacy of the Communist Party’s interests, of the public’s interests and (in third place) of the law. Global Times, an English-language paper in Beijing, said public support for the death penalty for non-violent crimes was falling, and expressed hope that the supreme court would take heed of this. But it lamented that public opinion may affect what it coyly called “judicial independence” in the case of Ms Wu. 2008年，当没受过法律训练的王胜俊被任命为最高法院院长后，司法改革的声音就喑哑了。王胜俊是胡锦涛主席关于司法工作“三个至上”说法的坚定支持者。这“三个至上”是：党的事业至上、人民利益至上，以及排在第三位的宪法法律至上。北京的一家英文报纸《环球日报》说，公众对非暴力犯罪的死刑判决的支持率正在降低，希望最高法院注意到这一点；但又表示遗憾说，在吴英的案子上，公众 意见 文理分科指导河道管理范围浙江建筑工程概算定额教材专家评审意见党员教师互相批评意见 可能会影响到“司法独立”(这个词是文章羞答答地说出来的)。 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------[注]据报道，吴英获死刑罪名为“集资诈骗罪”。 [2012.01.28]Black, white and blood red 黑色白色与血色 Weegee’s photographs 维吉的照片 Black, white and blood red 黑色白色与血色[注1] The sordid beauty of the city 纽约市那迷离暗淡的凄美 Jan 28th 2012 | NEW YORK | from the print edition WEEGEE’S photographs of the seamy side of New York are luridly fascinating: car crashes, tenement fires and lifeless bodies sprawled across pavements. He always carried a Speed Graphic camera with a massive flash in his nocturnal prowls around the city, which made his night-time shots both intelligible and distinctive. The extreme contrasts in black and white were perfectly suited to the extreme situations he depicted, with people who were generally weeping, leering or dead. 维吉拍摄了纽约市丑陋的一面，照片极具戏剧性，让人入迷：车祸、贫民区合租屋起火，还有横卧人行道、四肢伸展的死尸。他总是在城市的夜色中四处潜行，那台记者照相机 [注1]辅以硕大的闪光灯，让他的夜景照片鲜活而又独特。黑与白的极度反差能够完美地凸现他所表现的极端场景，那里的人物通常是在痛哭、在偷看或者已经死去。 Born Usher Fellig in 1899 in a part of the world that is now Ukraine, Weegee moved with his family to New York’s Lower East Side in 1909. His nickname came either from an early stint as a “squeegee boy” (ie, a darkroom assistant) or from his Ouija-like ability to get to a crime scene faster than the authorities—though this clairvoyance owed much to his police radio. 1899年维吉生于现在的乌克兰（当时属于奥地利），原名尤瑟尔•费利克（Usher Fellig），1909年他随家庭来到纽约下东区 [注2]。维吉是他的绰号，或许是他早期当过的“斯奎基练习生”（即暗室助理）的简写，或许是因为他能比当局更快地来到犯罪现场的那种灵应牌 [注3]式的能力（实际上，他这种千里眼式的能力很大程度上归功于他收听的警察无线通话）。 “Murder Is My Business”, a new exhibition at the International Center of Photography (ICP), takes its name from two shows Weegee held at the Photo League in 1941. Drawn from the ICP’s vast archive of his work—a gift from his longtime companion, Wilma Wilcox, in 1993—these photos are from the first decade of his career. Weegee would later give up tabloid snaps and experiment with film and art photography. He died in 1968. But these early images, crafted for maximum effect and immediate consumption, as in “Hold-up Man Killed, November 24th 1941” (pictured above), show him at his popular and populist best. “我与谋杀打交道”，是在国际摄影中心（International Center of Photography (ICP)）举行的新展览，得名于1941年维吉在“摄影联盟”的两次展览。1993年，他多年的伴侣维尔玛•威尔科克斯把他庞大的作品文档作为礼物赠送给ICP，新展的照片便选自其中，是他职业生涯头十年的创作。后来维吉不再从事小报摄影，而是尝试进入影坛与拍摄艺术照。他死于1968年。但如上图中那幅《1941年11月24日：被杀的拦路抢劫者》所表达的那样，这些具有最强烈效果和直接使用价值的早期照片最能让人清楚地看到，他受到人们的欢迎的原因以及他贴近普通人的一面。 These photos are displayed against a soundscape of police sirens and jazz, with a selection of the newspaper clippings where they first appeared. Viewing Weegee’s shots with the accompanying text grants a sense of the social and economic ferment of the time. New Yorkers could open the paper and read about three women who had been trampled to death in a stampede. Another 1941 shot, “Killing for a Warm Glass of Beer” includes a dog hovering indifferently over a dead body in a bar. 这些照片以警笛与爵士音乐为背景音展出，周围是一些最早登载这些照片的报纸剪贴。观赏维吉照片的同时阅读这些报章内容，能令人感受当时的社会与经济动乱。那时候的纽约人打开报纸，时常可以读到“三名妇女被践踏而死”一类新闻。在另一祯1941年的照片，《一瓶温啤酒引起的谋杀》中的画面里，可以看到一只狗在酒吧里的一具尸体上顿足四望，一副毫不在乎的样子。 Weegee considered himself a journalist first, peddling his wares to the city’s seedier dailies, but he was also an artist with a keen sense of composition. Although his subject was crime, his pictures often included the craned necks and gawking looks of bystanders. Weegee’s fascination with the voyeurs who crowd murder scenes is given pride of place in a 1941 clipping from PM Daily, “Brooklyn School Children See Gambler Murdered in Street”. His large photo of the ogling schoolchildren dwarfs a much smaller shot of the murdered body on the page. A girl in front angles her neck to get a better look, her eyes wide; a blond boy beams with what looks to be sheer joy. The newspaper’s editors cropped the image around the faces, whereas Weegee’s wider shot includes the menacing silhouettes of several low-slung buildings against a darkening sky. 维吉认为他首先是一个向城市中的二流日报兜售作品的新闻记者；但他也是一个具有敏锐创作感的艺术家。尽管他以犯罪为主题，但在他的照片中经常可以看到引颈张望、目瞪口呆的旁观者。维吉热衷于表现谋杀现场周围的成群围观者，这一点在1941年的一份PM Daily[注4]剪报上的照片，《布鲁克林的学童观看街头被害赌徒》中显得十分突出。他以大幅画面着力刻画了凝视现场的学童，这与死者无足轻重的小镜头恰成对照。前排的一个女孩瞪大了眼睛，偏着头让自己看得更清楚；一个浅色头发的男孩面露微笑，一副兴奋的表情。报纸的编辑绕着人物的面部裁剪了照片，而维吉更大的照片中包括几所低矮建筑物阴沉沉的剪影，背后是正在暗淡下去的天空。 Weegee lacked formal training, but he knew how to give people what they want: naked emotions, grisly details. It is illuminating to view these images now, when tabloid photography has become no less garish and closer to ubiquitous. Weegee understood the difference between a cheap image and a sensational one. His photographs keep us looking. 维吉没有受过正规的训练，但他知道如何表现人们想看的东西：不加掩饰的情感、狰狞可怖的细节。当此小报摄影依旧华而不实、更接近于无所不在的情况下，重温这些照片让人深省。维吉很清楚拍摄手法平庸的照片与令人震撼的照片之间的差别。他的照片无不令我们凝眸良久。 [注1]Black， white，and blood red 是Bodean乐队的一首歌的名字（详见19楼），这里用以表示用黑白照相表现血腥更为清晰。 [注2]Speed Graphic是纽约Rochester的Graflex公司的产品，是最著名的记者用照相机。[注3]纽约下东区在纽约市曼哈顿区沿东河南端一带，为犹太移民聚居地。 [注4]灵应牌（Ouija）是术士在行术时使用的招魂牌，上有字母与数字；其英文发音类似于Weegee。 [注5]PM Daily 是一份美国纽约的左翼日报，存在于1940年6月与1948年6月之间。 有《踏莎行》歪词一首为证： 雾锁青天，云遮翠岭，帘垂万里春不醒。 愁城紧闭恨难消，戏鱼随手敲金井。 月色初晴，梅雨时令，东风一度春无影。 却看桃李泪行行，千秋送目空山景。 [2012.01.25]Phew, the Oscars are still irrelevant 奥斯卡奖还是不靠谱 Film awards 电影奖 Phew, the Oscars are still irrelevant 吁，幸好奥斯卡还是不靠谱 Jan 25th 2012, 10:38 by N.B. | LONDON WHAT a difference a year makes. Last year’s Oscar nominees showcased the American movie industry at its most confident. The Best Picture category was stuffed with films that combined intelligence and quirkiness with sheer entertainment: “The Social Network”, “Inception”, “True Grit”, “Winter’s Bone”, “Toy Story 3”, “The Kids Are All Right”, “Black Swan”, etc. Of course, they were all beaten on the night by “The King’s Speech”, but you can’t have everything. Twelve months on, it’s a different matter. Scanning the 2012 nominations, you might suspect that Hollywood had used up its best and boldest films in one splurge a year ago, leaving it with little in reserve to get excited about now. 一年的时间里可以有太多变化了！去年奥斯卡提名展示了美国电影界一些最自信的大作。最佳影片奖的提名挤满了集智慧，离奇与纯粹的娱乐为一体的影片：《社交网络》，《盗梦空间》，《大地惊雷》，《冬天的骨头》，《玩具总动员3》，《孩子们都很好》，《黑天鹅》等等。当然，在颁奖之夜它们都被《国王的演讲》击败了，不过鱼与熊掌，不可兼得嘛。十二个月之后，完全不一样了。过一遍2012年的提名名单，你可能会怀疑好莱坞一年前一口气用光了它最优秀，最大胆的电影，以致现在没什么像样的存货。 Dotted among the categories, there are nominations for several films which were widely panned, including “Transformers: Dark Of The Moon”, “Albert Nobbs”, Madonna’s dreadful “W.E.”, and “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close”, surely one of the worst reviewed films ever to get a Best Picture nomination. There are nominations for decent but frequently clichéd dramas: “Moneyball”, “Warrior”. There are nods to directors who may be at their most likeable, but who aren’t at their strongest: Martin Scorsese’s “Hugo” and Woody Allen’s “Midnight in Paris”. And some of the Best Picture nominations recall the bad old “Driving Miss Daisy” days when the Oscars went to any film which dealt with human cruelty in the most soft and sentimental fashion: “The Help” and “War Horse”. 在各个提名奖项中掺杂了几部恶评如潮的影片，像是《变形金刚：月黑之时》，《变装男侍》，麦当娜执导的那部糟透了的《W.E》，还有《心灵钥匙》——这肯定是历史上最佳影片提名作品中影评最差的一部片子了。也有一些拍得不错，但是情节过于老套的剧情片：像是《点球成金》，《勇士》。提名中点到的一些导演拍的片子可能颇为讨喜，却没有很好展露他们的强项，像是马丁·斯科西斯的《雨果》，还有伍迪·艾伦的《午夜巴黎》。另几部最佳影片提名则让我们回想起《为戴茜小姐开车》那个糟糕的时代，当时任何以最柔和煽情方式讨论人性残忍的电影都能拿下大奖，今年这样的片子包括《相助》和《战马》。 To be fair, Hollywood has acknowledged its falling off in standards by giving more prominence than usual to films from other countries. Two of the five “Best Animated Feature” nominees are from outside America (for once, there’s no Pixar cartoon in the running). Iran’s “A Separation” is a surprising but deserving honoree in the Original Screenplay category. The frontrunner in the Best Picture category, among others, is “The Artist”, which may be set in Hollywood, and which may not have any French dialogue, but which is definitely a French film. You could even argue that “Hugo”, “War Horse” and “Midnight in Paris” are honorary foreign films, in that they’re all love letters to Europe. 凭心而论，好莱坞承认了这次其电影水准不足，因此提名中比往常更多地突出了外国电影。五部“最佳动画片奖”的提名中有两部来自美国以外（这一次居然没有皮克斯的动画片）。伊朗电影